Friday, July 31, 2015

The first incarnation of the State Museum of Pennsylvania
was located in the Executive office building (now the Ryan Building) attached
to the State Capitol. Due to limited expeditions by the museum, this first archaeology
gallery contained items primarily donated from local collectors. Subsequent excavations
sponsored by the Pennsylvania Historical Commission (now the Pennsylvania
Historical and Museum Commission) were some of the first to produce provenienced
collections that offered reliable insight into the lives of Pennsylvania’s
prehistoric inhabitants.

Using information gathered from 1931 excavations at the
Schultz site and historical accounts of other Susquehannock and Iroquoian village
sites, museum preparators Linneaus G. Duncan and Charles Andes crafted the display
we now know as the Schultz site diorama. The wax figures stand approximately 6
inches tall and were created from plaster molds. Once extracted from the mold,
the models were posed and details such as clothing, hair, and color were
meticulously added by Mr. Duncan, the museum’s chief preparator. In the
photograph below, Linneaus Duncan sculpts one of the figures, note the plaster mold
in the foreground with figures in varying degrees of completion arranged behind
it.

(Photo: PHMC Collections)

Oil paints were used to add color, and small pieces of
leather and fur were used for clothing. Often overlooked details of this
display are the miniature deer skins - one is tacked to the exterior of the
structure and another is draped across a log. Upon closer inspection, these tiny
pelts are revealed to be the furs of mice. Among the materials used by the preparators during the time
of the diorama’s construction were various chemicals, oils, shellac, varnish, various
paints, plasteline clay, beeswax (likely the material used to make the
figures), and assorted brushes and tools. These items were indicated on a
supply list dated 1932.

Linneaus Duncan (right) and Charles
Andes (left) prepare the area outside the stockade village

(Photo: PHMC Collections)

Completed by 1933, the Schultz site diorama was intended to
give museum visitors a view into prehistoric life that left no detail to the
imagination. The craftsmanship and care taken in the display’s creation is
still evident today. In the 1960s, the diorama was deemed “too good not to
use”, and was moved to its current location for the opening of the William Penn
Memorial Museum (now the State Museum of Pennsylvania) in 1965.

The Schultz site diorama in its
original location at the old State Museum

(Photo: PHMC Collections)

ABOUT THE SCHULTZ SITE

Since the 1930s, our knowledge of the Susquehannock culture
has expanded considerably. The Schultz site (36La7) was a mid to late 16th
century Susquehannock village located in Lancaster County. The first
excavations at this site were executed by Donald Cadzow in 1931 and were
sponsored by the Pennsylvania Historical Commission. These excavations yielded,
among other things, ornamental objects and pottery from features. Subsequent
excavations in 1969 revealed extensive detail about the Susquehannock culture
of the 16th century. Among the records from the latter excavation
are maps of excavations revealing the stockade and the shape and layout of
house structures. Contrary to the diorama, house structures were often rounded
at the ends, as opposed to squared. In
addition, we do not really know the height of the stockade or if it held a
firing platform. Finally, we now know that the Susquehannocks buried their dead
in cemeteries and not mounds as depicted on the far right of the diorama. Susquehannocks
occupied village sites in the Susquehanna River valley (shown in the diorama’s
background) in central Pennsylvania from the 16th century to the
time of European contact.

Friday, July 17, 2015

We are continuing
our celebration of the 50th anniversary of the opening of The State
Museum of Pennsylvania. This week will
take us back a little beyond that 50 year window in an effort to set the stage
for one of the most spectacular sites to be excavated in central Pennsylvania.

In 1957, John E.
Miller of Altoona, Pennsylvania was the guest of John Folk, also from Altoona,
on a boat trip down the Raystown Branch of the Juniata River. They enjoyed a conversation about the
surrounding landscape mentioning that it was well suited for rock shelters. Miller learned that there was such a place
and upon visiting it that day dug a test pit toward the back wall of the
shelter. He quickly began recovering
pottery, animal bones, mussel shells, charcoal and a stone hoe. The following year he revisited the site with
some other friends and dug a subsequent pit revealing many organic artifacts;
corncobs, cornhusks, cornstalks, cordage and more.

Corncobs, cornhusks and seeds

Cordage and woven mat or fabric

Cordage and fish hook

This is what makes Sheep Rock Shelter (36Hu1),
as it came to be named, such a spectacular site. It was a dry rock overhang enabling the
preservation of organic material, something almost never found in the wet,
humid climate of Pennsylvania.

Archaeologist
studying prehistory in Northeastern North America often speculate that the variety
of stone tools we most often associate with prehistoric people actually
represents only about 10% of their material culture. The other 90% would have been made out of
perishable or organic materials; and therefor lost to the ravages of time and
decomposition. Sheep Rock Shelter represents
a small, local window into that rarely seen part of everyday prehistoric life.

Fortunately, these
men realized the rarity of uncovering artifacts such as these; and that they
needed professional guidance. Miller
entrusted his brother-in-law and co-excavator Melville Corl to take samples of
the artifacts to a meeting of The Society of Pennsylvania Archaeology where he
shared them with John Witthoft, the State Anthropologist with the Pennsylvania
State Museum (currently The State Museum of Pennsylvania).

The first order of
business was to find the landowner of the rock shelter, which proved to be more
difficult than expected. Permission was
eventually granted and on July 14, 1958 the first systematic excavations
commenced. It was Melville Corl, E. J.
Stackhouse, Raymond Zeak and Tommy Lukehart who were contributing to the
original excavations. Trudging through
the woods with equipment and then boating the final leg to begin digging at the
site.

"Sheep Rock Shelter Dig Summer 1960, Entrance Way to Dig Showingledge going into the River" description from back of photograph

John Witthoft arrived on July 21 to inspect and participate in the
dig. Due to the volume and unique nature
of the artifacts recovered, the threat of looting and the difficult logistics
accessing the site, it was decided to turn the site over to the Pennsylvania
State Museum. In 1959, John Witthoft,
the State Anthropologist and Fred Kinsey III, the State Archaeologist took
responsibility, on behalf of the museum, for any future excavations at the
site.

"Sheep Rock Shelter, Site 36Hu1, July 1958Celts where found in Crevases at back wall of shelter"description from back of photograph

In the summer of 1959
Fred Kinsey excavated at Sheep rock with a crew of students, as a field school
through the Pennsylvania State University.
The same arrangement continued for the following three years under the
direction of John Witthoft. During those
years of excavation they dug to a depth of more than twenty feet within the
shelter and produced an estimated 80,000 artifacts.

They were also producing some very well
trained archaeologists that continued a legacy of scientific excavation and
publication in Pennsylvania archaeology.
Through these efforts the basis for our understanding of the occupation
and geologic sequence of the region was formed.

There were no
excavations the following two years until 1965 when Ira Smith, a former Sheep
Rock field school student and later the State Field Archaeologist for the
William Penn Museum (currently The State Museum of Pennsylvania), conducted a
survey of the area. Plans had been made
by the Army Corp of Engineers to build a dam which would flood the Raystown
Branch of the Juniata River, covering Sheep Rock Shelter with more than one
hundred feet of water. Smith’s survey
was responsible for finding 35 additional sites that would have been lost. Excavations,
especially in the Archaic levels, of the shelter resumed.

Excavations
continued the following year, again as a field school but this time as a joined
effort of the Pennsylvania State University and Juniata College under the
direction of Joe Michaels and Ira Smith.

Sheep Rock Shelter
remains one of the most amazing sites excavated in Pennsylvania. It harbored some of the most unique artifacts
of everyday prehistoric life for thousands of years. Keeping them dry and preserved as a result of
its unique geological conditions. Although the real site is inaccessible now in
the depths of Raystown Lake you can get a sense of what it was like by visiting
the Anthropology/Archaeology gallery at The State Museum of Pennsylvania. Exhibited just to the left of the open
excavation you can see what the shelter was like. The back wall of the exhibit was created from
a mold of the actual back wall of the shelter.
Also exhibited in the Technology area of the gallery are the bark
basket, fabric, cordage, netting, canoe paddle, and fire making kit all
recovered from this remarkable site.

Bark Basket

Please feel free to
search through our past blogs for more information about Sheep Rock Shelter, or
see the following sources used in this week’s editions of TWIPA.

Thursday, July 2, 2015

This week, we continue our celebration
of the 50thanniversary of the opening of The State Museum of
Pennsylvania in 1965 with a trip down memory lane to the early 1970s.
The 1970s were fruitful times for the Pennsylvania archaeology as interest in the less explored areas of PA arose. A major climatic
disaster hit much of the eastern coast of the United States including a large
area of central Pennsylvania. In late June of 1972, Tropical Storm Agnes tormented
Pennsylvania with torrential rains lasting for a week. Agnes struck with winds between 25-45 mph and
heavy rains across the area, causing rivers and creeks to rise at alarming
rates. Flooding removed large amounts
of earth and buried artifacts from archaeological sites were cropping up to the
surface, causing great concern for the loss of this culture history.

For one curious archaeology student, William
Turnbaugh, the Lycoming Creek Valley and section of the West Branch Valley of
the Susquehanna River in Lycoming county was one of those archaeologically
untapped regions of Pennsylvania. Turnbaugh became interested in archaeology
and basketry in particular in the early 60s when he was given the opportunity
to handle the remains of the collections from the Lycoming County historical
society as he assisted in the moving of the collections to the New Museum, now
the Thomas T. Taber Museum, after a fire at the previous location. By 1967, as
a high school student, Turnbaugh became vice president and acting president of
the New Museum and in 1970 he left for a college education at Harvard
University. So, with an interest in north-central Pennsylvania and specifically
Lycoming county and growing up there Turnbaugh turned this interest into his
doctoral dissertation.

After receiving
an NSF grant he began his dissertation in 1972 just two days after the peak of
the Agnes flooding. He describes the scene as,

“Scores of vacant windows stared from towns of
muddy homes, apartments, stores and churches, all looking out onto lawns and
trees and streets filled with yet more of the stinking oily mud… One marveled
at the boats and campers and travel trailers and cars cluttered together at
various eddy points… Everywhere there were trees and other natural debris;
houses, chicken coops, outhouses and barn roofs; jewelry, silverware,
typewriters, television; mementos and family photos and books.” (Turnbaugh 1973;
66-67)

Turnbaugh’s
survey which is known as the West Branch Survey spanned over a large area of
Lycoming and eastern Clinton counties focusing on localities near the river and
streams. The survey covered more than 160 miles of terrain and uncovered 53
prehistoric sites ranging back as far as the Paleoindian period (11700 BP-19800
BP) through the Contact period (1650 AD-1550 AD). Artifacts recovered included projectile points
from throughout all of our time periods as well as pottery and other stone
tools.

various points from Turnbaugh's survey

net sinkers and groundstone tools from Turnbaugh's survey

prehistoric ceramics from Turnbaugh's survey

knife/scraper and broken drill base from Turnbaugh's survey

Overall, William
Turnbaugh played a major part in our understanding of how geology and the environment factors into site
development in this region of the state. He also developed and improved our
understanding of the prehistoric cultural history of the region and recording extent archaeological
sites from the Susquehanna River basin.

References:

Turnbaugh, William

1973 Cultural Prehistory and Demographic Patterns in North-Central
Pennsylvania. Manuscript on file, Section of Archaeology, State Museum of
Pennsylvania.

United
States Department of Commerce National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

1973Final Report of the Disaster Survey Team on the Events of Agnes: A
Report to the Administrator. Natural Disaster Survey Report 73-1. Copy
available at http://www.nws.noaa.gov/om/assessments/pdfs/Hurricane%20Agnes%201972.pdf.

One Tank Trip

WFMZ-TV 69 from Reading, Pennsylvania visited The State Museum of Pennsylvania on February 8th, 2017. Karin Mallett prepared a feature piece on great places to visit that are one tank of gas from Reading and our gallery was the focus of this visit. Karin interviewed Kurt Carr, Senior Curator and Janet Johnson in the gallery and provide a nice overview of the spectacular exhibits. Please click on the link below and enjoy this glimpse of the museum during this One Tank Trip!
One Tank Trip: Hall of Anthropology and Archaeology

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